History

The Hill, Chesson & Woody brand traces its roots back to 1971, when Dan W. Hill, III, CLU, ChFC, MSFS created Dan Hill & Associates to broker life insurance policies. Three years later, Earl G. Chesson, CLU, ChFC, CAP, began to work closely with Dan, also brokering life insurance policies. While operating as independent companies, they shared and together built the brand of Hill, Chesson & Associates.

In 1979, Dan took a new direction by creating unique programs for UNC-Chapel Hill, Duke University and North Carolina State to provide medical insurance for students of those institutions. Earl Chesson lead the Wealth Strategies company that specializes in the field of advanced wealth transfer, and philanthropy and liquidity planning for ultra high net worth clients.

So, how did the Woody part of the brand get started? In July 2000, Skip Woody, a nine-year associate of Dan Hill’s company, departed the student insurance business to start his own firm focusing on employee benefits. He recruited Todd Yates to join him in leading that endeavor. Today, Skip and Todd’s employee benefits company, HCW Employee Benefit Services, has grown rapidly, building a reputation in the marketplace for helping clients manage their benefits as a strategic asset of their business.

That’s the story! Four gentlemen running three separate companies, working under the shared brand of Hill, Chesson & Woody, have been successfully listening to the market and delivering an array of solutions for many years.